White Guard description. Home and City - the two main characters of the novel "The White Guard

1. Introduction. M. A. Bulgakov was one of those few writers who, during the years of all-powerful Soviet censorship, continued to defend their rights to authorial independence.

Despite the furious persecution and the ban on publishing, Bulgakov never followed the lead of the authorities and created sharp independent works. One of them is the novel "The White Guard".

2. History of creation. Bulgakov was a direct witness to all the horrors of the Civil War. The events of 1918-1919 made a great impression on him. in Kyiv, when power passed several times to different political forces.

In 1922, the writer decided to write a novel, the main characters of which would be the people closest to him - white officers and intellectuals. Bulgakov worked on The White Guard during 1923-1924.

He read individual chapters in friendly companies. The listeners noted the undoubted merits of the novel, but agreed that it would be unrealistic to print it in Soviet Russia. The first two parts of The White Guard were nevertheless published in 1925 in two issues of the Rossiya magazine.

3. The meaning of the name. The name "White Guard" carries a partly tragic, partly ironic meaning. The Turbin family is a staunch monarchist. They firmly believe that only the monarchy can save Russia. At the same time, the Turbins see that there is no longer any hope for restoration. The abdication of the tsar was an irrevocable step in the history of Russia.

The problem lies not only in the strength of opponents, but also in the fact that there are practically no real people devoted to the idea of ​​the monarchy. The "White Guard" is a dead symbol, a mirage, a dream that will never come true.

The irony of Bulgakov is most clearly manifested in the scene of a night of drinking in the Turbins' house with enthusiastic talk about the revival of the monarchy. Only in this remains the strength of the "white guard". Sobering up and a hangover exactly resemble the state of the noble intelligentsia a year after the revolution.

4. Genre Novel

5. Theme. The main theme of the novel is the horror and helplessness of the townsfolk in the face of huge political and social upheavals.

6. Issues. The main problem of the novel is the feeling of uselessness and uselessness among white officers and noble intelligentsia. There is no one to continue the fight, and it does not make any sense. There are no such people as Turbins left. Betrayal and deceit reign among the white movement. Another problem is the sharp division of the country into many political opponents.

The choice has to be made not only between monarchists and Bolsheviks. Hetman, Petliura, bandits of all stripes - these are just the most significant forces that are tearing apart Ukraine and, in particular, Kyiv. Ordinary inhabitants, who do not want to join any camp, become defenseless victims of the next owners of the city. An important problem is the huge number of victims of the fratricidal war. Human life has depreciated so much that murder has become an everyday thing.

7. Heroes. Turbin Alexey, Turbin Nikolai, Elena Vasilievna Talberg, Vladimir Robertovich Talberg, Myshlaevsky, Shervinsky, Vasily Lisovich, Lariosik.

8. Plot and composition. The action of the novel takes place in late 1918 - early 1919. In the center of the story is the Turbin family - Elena Vasilyevna with two brothers. Alexei Turbin recently returned from the front, where he worked as a military doctor. He dreamed of a simple and quiet life, of a private medical practice. Dreams are not destined to come true. Kyiv is becoming the scene of a fierce struggle, which in some ways is even worse than the situation on the front line.

Nikolai Turbin is still very young. The romantically minded young man endures the power of the Hetman with pain. He sincerely and ardently believes in the monarchical idea, he dreams of taking up arms to defend it. Reality roughly destroys all his idealistic ideas. The first combat clash, the betrayal of the high command, the death of Nai-Turs hit Nikolai. He realizes that he has harbored disembodied illusions so far, but he cannot believe it.

Elena Vasilievna is an example of the resilience of a Russian woman who will protect and take care of her loved ones with all her might. Turbin's friends admire her and, thanks to Elena's support, find the strength to live on. In this regard, Elena's husband, staff captain Talberg, makes a sharp contrast.

Thalberg is the main negative character in the novel. This is a man who has no convictions at all. He easily adapts to any authority for the sake of his career. Talberg's flight before Petlyura's offensive was due only to his sharp statements against the latter. In addition, Talberg learned that a new major political force was being formed on the Don, promising power and influence.

In the image of the captain, Bulgakov showed the worst qualities of the white officers, which led to the defeat of the white movement. Careerism and lack of a sense of homeland are deeply disgusting to the Turbin brothers. Thalberg betrays not only the defenders of the city, but also his wife. Elena Vasilievna loves her husband, but even she is amazed by his act and in the end is forced to admit that he is a bastard.

Vasilisa (Vasily Lisovich) personifies the worst type of layman. He does not evoke pity, since he himself is ready to betray and inform, if he had the courage. Vasilisa's main concern is to better hide the accumulated wealth. Before the love of money, the fear of death even recedes in him. A bandit search in the apartment is the best punishment for Vasilisa, especially since he still saved his miserable life.

Bulgakov's inclusion in the novel of the original character, Lariosik, looks a bit strange. This is a clumsy young man who, by some miracle, survived, having made his way to Kyiv. Critics believe that the author deliberately introduced Lariosik to soften the tragedy of the novel.

As you know, Soviet criticism subjected the novel to merciless persecution, declaring the writer a defender of white officers and "philistine". However, the novel does not defend the white movement in the least. On the contrary, Bulgakov paints a picture of incredible decline and decay in this environment. The main supporters of the Turbina monarchy, in fact, no longer want to fight with anyone. They are ready to become townsfolk, shutting themselves off from the surrounding hostile world in their warm and comfortable apartment. The news reported by their friends is depressing. The white movement no longer exists.

The most honest and noble order, paradoxical as it may seem, is the order for the junkers to drop their weapons, tear off their shoulder straps and go home. Bulgakov himself subjects the "White Guard" to sharp criticism. At the same time, the main thing for him is the tragedy of the Turbin family, who are unlikely to find their place in a new life.

9. What does the author teach. Bulgakov refrains from any authorial assessments in the novel. The reader's attitude to what is happening arises only through the dialogues of the main characters. Of course, this is pity for the Turbin family, pain for the bloody events shaking Kyiv. The "White Guard" is the writer's protest against any political upheavals that always bring death and humiliation to ordinary people.

In the novel "The White Guard" the writer addresses many serious and eternal topics. From the very first pages of the novel, the themes of family, home, faith, moral duty, relevant at all times, sound as the beginning of all beginnings, the source of life and culture, the guarantee of preserving the best traditions and moral values.

Bulgakov managed to live in a difficult time for Russia. The Revolution, and then the Civil War, forced people to rethink all previously learned values. The writer was very worried about the events taking place and with all his heart tried to understand the reality surrounding him. And he realized that the main trouble in Russia was the decline in the level of morality, lack of culture and ignorance, which, in his opinion, was associated with the destruction of the intelligentsia, which for a long time had been the main bearer of moral values.

The heroes of the novel "The White Guard", like the writer himself, are representatives of the intelligentsia. Far from all the Russian intelligentsia accepted and understood the great accomplishments of October. Fears for the fate of the country's culture played an important role in the rejection of these achievements, the path to achieving which was difficult and often contradictory. The main theme of the novel, which is usually associated with the tragic motive of the disappointment of the characters, with the need they feel to break with their past, is revealed in a new way. The past, in which the heroes' happy childhood remains, not only does not disappoint them, but is saved by them in every possible way in an environment where it seems that "everything is destroyed, betrayed, sold."

The whole novel is permeated with a sense of disaster. The heroes still sing the hymn "God Save the Tsar", and make a toast to the health of the already non-existent monarch, but this shows their despair. Everything that happens to them appears as a tragedy of people who faithfully served this system, which suddenly revealed all its inconsistency, hypocrisy, and falsehood. The position of Bulgakov's heroes could not have been different, because the writer himself did not feel nostalgia for the old, bourgeois Russia, its monarchical past.

House and City are the two main characters of the novel. The Turbin House on Alekseevsky Spusk, depicted with all the features of a family idyll crossed out by the war, breathes and suffers like a living being. When it’s cold outside, it’s alarming and scary, a heart-to-heart conversation is going on in the house, warmth emanates from the tiles of the stove, the tower clock in the dining room is heard, the strumming of a guitar and the familiar voices of Alexei, Elena, Nikolka and their cheerful guests. And the City, tormented by endless battles and shelling, filled with crowds of soldiers, also lives its own life. “Beautiful in frost and fog...” - this epithet opens the story about the City and becomes dominant in its image. The image of the City radiates an extraordinary light - the light of life, which is truly inextinguishable. Bulgakov City is under God’s protection: “But best of all, the electric white cross sparkled in the hands of the enormous Vladimir on Vladimir Hill, and it was visible far away, and often ... found by its light ... the way to the City ... "

In the morning, the Turbine began to dream of the City. It is not called Kiev anywhere, although its signs are clear, it is simply a City, but with a capital letter, as something generalized, eternal. It is described in detail in the dreams of Alexei Turbin: “Like a multi-tiered honeycomb, the City smoked and roared and lived. Beautiful in frost and fog on the mountains, above the Dnieper. The streets smoked with mist, the gigantic snow creaked... The gardens stood silent and calm, weighed down by white, untouched snow. And there were as many gardens in the City as in no other city in the world... In winter, as in no other city in the world, peace fell on the streets and alleys of both the upper City, on the mountains, and the Lower City, spread out in the bend of the frozen Dnieper.. Played with light and shimmered, glowed and danced and shimmered The city at night until the morning, and in the morning it faded, dressed in smoke and fog. In this symbolic picture, the memories of youth, the beauty of the City and anxiety for its future, for the fate of everyone, are combined.

The “Eternal Golden City” is opposed to the City of 1918, the existence of which brings to mind the biblical legend of Babylon. Confusion and turmoil reign in the city, which the writer often emphasizes by repeating the words: “Germans!! Germans!! Germans!!”, “Petliura. Petliura. Petliura. Petliura”, “Patrols, patrols, patrols”. The author cannot remain indifferent to what is happening in the City (mobilization, rumors, the hetman, the proximity of Petlyura, theft, murders, stupid orders of superiors, deceit, mysterious Moscow in the northeast, the Bolsheviks, close shooting and constant alarm). Thanks to the author's expressive characteristics, the reader finds himself at the mercy of a peculiar effect of presence: he breathes the air of the City, absorbs its anxieties, hears the voices of the junkers, feels Elena's fear for her brothers.

With the beginning of the war, a diverse audience flocked under the shadow of the Vladimir Cross: aristocrats and bankers who fled from the capital, industrialists and merchants, poets and journalists, actresses and cocottes. Gradually, the appearance of the City loses its integrity, becomes shapeless: "The City swelled, expanded, climbed like a dough from a pot." The natural course of life is disturbed, the usual order of things falls apart. Almost all the townspeople find themselves drawn into a dirty political spectacle.

The theme of preserving spiritual, moral and cultural traditions runs through the entire novel, but it is most vividly implemented in the image of the house. Life in this house is contrary to the surrounding unrest, bloodshed, devastation, cruelty. The mistress and soul of the house is Elena Turbina-Talberg - "the beautiful Elena", the personification of beauty, kindness, Eternal Femininity. Thalberg, the duplicitous opportunist, leaves this house. And the friends of the Turbins find shelter here, heal their wounded bodies and souls in it. And even the opportunist and coward Lisovich is looking for protection from robbers here.

The Turbin House is depicted in the novel as a fortress under siege but not surrendering. The author attaches a lofty, almost philosophical meaning to his image. According to Alexei Turbin, a house is the highest value of being, for the sake of preserving which a person “fights and, in essence, one should not fight for anything else.” The only goal that allows one to take up arms, in his opinion, is to protect "human peace and hearth."

Everything is beautiful in the Turbins' house: old red velvet furniture, beds with shiny knobs, cream-colored curtains, a bronze lamp with a shade, chocolate-bound books, a piano, flowers, an icon in an ancient setting, a tiled stove, a clock with a gavotte; “The tablecloth, despite the cannons and all this languor, anxiety and nonsense, is white and starchy ... The floors are glossy, and in December, blue hydrangeas and two gloomy and sultry roses stand on the table in a frosted vase, affirming the beauty and strength of life.” The atmosphere of the house is inspired by music and ever-living art. Cousin Lariosik from Zhytomyr, who has found shelter in the Turbins' house, blesses the family comfort with an ingenuous confession: "Lord, cream curtains ... behind them you rest your soul ... But our wounded souls crave peace so much ..." Turbins and their friends read on in the evenings and sing along with the guitar, play cards, love and experience, and sacredly keep family traditions.

The war for each of the heroes of the novel becomes a test, a test of the moral foundations of the individual. It is no coincidence that in the epigraph to the novel, Bulgakov places the famous lines from the Apocalypse: "and each will be judged according to his deeds." The main theme of the novel is the theme of retribution for one's actions, the theme of moral responsibility for the choice that each person makes.

Among the defenders of the monarchy were different people. Bulgakov hates high-ranking officials who think not about saving the Fatherland, but about saving their own skin. He does not hide his attitude to the opportunist Talberg with "two-layer eyes", the cowardly and greedy engineer Lisovich, the unprincipled Mikhail Semenovich Shpolyansky.

But if Thalberg is “a damned doll, devoid of the slightest concept of honor”, ​​running away from a sinking ship, leaving his brothers and wife, then the main characters of the novel are the embodiment of the best knightly qualities. Ordinary members of the white movement, according to the author, are the heirs of the military glory of the Fatherland. When the Mortar Regiment, formed to defend the City, marched along the corridors of the Alexander Gymnasium, in the lobby right in front of it, it was as if “a sparkling Alexander flew out”, pointing to the Borodino field. The sounded song to the words of Lermontov's "Borodino", according to the author, is a symbol of valor, courage, honor, that is, everything that distinguishes the Turbins, Myshlaevsky, Malyshev from other "gentlemen of the officers."

The officer's honor required the protection of the white banner, loyalty to the oath, the fatherland and the king. In an environment where it seems “everything is destroyed, betrayed, sold”, Alexei Turbin asks himself with bewilderment and pain: “Now we need to protect ... But what? Emptiness? The rumble of steps? And yet, he is not able to stay away from terrible events, to violate his duty as an officer and hurries to those who are trying to save the Fatherland without giving his fate into the unclean hands of Petlyura or Hetman Skoropadsky. Nai-Tours follows the laws of honor and nobility. Covering the junkers, he entered into an unequal duel, left alone with his machine gun in front of the advancing cavalrymen. Colonel Malyshev is also a man of honor. Realizing the futility of resistance, he makes the only correct decision in the current situation - he sends the junkers home. These people are ready to be with Russia in its troubles and trials, ready to defend the Fatherland, City and Home. Meeting new guests of the City, each of them sacrifices his life. The Almighty Himself takes them under His protection. With slight irony, Bulgakov portrayed the Kingdom of God in the novel, where the Apostle Peter receives the dead. Among them is Colonel Nai-Turs in a luminous helmet, chain mail, with a knight's sword from the time of the Crusades. Next to him is Sergeant Zhilin, who died in the First World War, and the Bolsheviks from Perekop, and many others who grabbed "each other by the throat", and now calmed down, fighting for their faith. The Lord God pronounces prophetic words: "All of you with me ... are the same - killed in the battlefield." Rising above the fight, the author sincerely mourns for all the dead: “Will anyone pay for the blood? No. Nobody. The snow will simply melt, the green Ukrainian grass will sprout, braid the earth... magnificent seedlings will come out... the heat will tremble under the fields and there will be no traces of blood. Cheap blood in the red fields, and no one will redeem it. Nobody".

Bulgakov believed in the natural human order on earth: "Everything will be right, the world is built on this." In the novel The White Guard, the writer showed how terrible and irreversible the consequences of deviation from the accepted norms of good and bad, consecrated by more than one millennium of human culture. In this retreat, the writer saw the greatest danger to humanity. He calls on his readers to be faithful to the main principles of humanity, devotion to the ideals of Justice, Goodness and Beauty.

The history of the creation of Bulgakov's novel "The White Guard"

The novel "White Guard" was first published (not completely) in Russia, in 1924. Completely - in Paris: volume one - 1927, volume two - 1929. The White Guard is largely an autobiographical novel based on the writer's personal impressions of Kyiv in late 1918 and early 1919.

The Turbin family is largely the Bulgakov family. Turbines is the maiden name of Bulgakov's grandmother on her mother's side. The "White Guard" was started in 1922, after the death of the writer's mother. The manuscripts of the novel have not survived. According to the typist Raaben, who retyped the novel, The White Guard was originally conceived as a trilogy. As possible titles of the novels of the proposed trilogy appeared "Midnight Cross" and "White Cross". Kyiv friends and acquaintances of Bulgakov became the prototypes of the heroes of the novel.

So, Lieutenant Viktor Viktorovich Myshlaevsky was written off from a childhood friend of Nikolai Nikolaevich Sigaevsky. Another friend of Bulgakov's youth, Yuri Leonidovich Gladyrevsky, an amateur singer, served as the prototype for Lieutenant Shervinsky. In The White Guard, Bulgakov seeks to show the people and the intelligentsia in the flames of the civil war in Ukraine. The main character, Aleksey Turbin, although clearly autobiographical, but, unlike the writer, is not a zemstvo doctor, who was only formally registered in the military service, but a real military doctor who has seen and experienced a lot during the years of World War II. The novel contrasts two groups of officers - those who “hate the Bolsheviks with a hot and direct hatred, one that can move into a fight” and “who returned from the war to their homes with the thought, like Alexei Turbin, to rest and arrange a new non-military, but ordinary human life.

Bulgakov sociologically accurately shows the mass movements of the era. He demonstrates the centuries-old hatred of the peasants for the landlords and officers, and the newly emerged, but no less deep hatred for the "occupiers. All this fueled the uprising raised against the formation of Hetman Skoropadsky, the leader of the Ukrainian national movement Petliura. Bulgakov called one of the main features of his work in the "White Guard" the stubborn portrayal of the Russian intelligentsia as the best layer in an impudent country.

In particular, the image of an intelligentsia-noble family, by the will of historical fate thrown into the camp of the White Guard during the Civil War, in the tradition of "War and Peace". “The White Guard” is a Marxist criticism of the 1920s: “Yes, Bulgakov's talent was precisely not as deep as it was brilliant, and the talent was great ... And yet Bulgakov's works are not popular. There is nothing in them that affected the people as a whole. There is a mysterious and cruel crowd.” Bulgakov's talent was not imbued with an interest in the people, in his life, his joys and sorrows cannot be recognized from Bulgakov.

M.A. Bulgakov twice, in two different works, recalls how his work on the novel The White Guard (1925) began. The hero of the “Theatrical novel” Maksudov says: “It was born at night, when I woke up after a sad dream. I dreamed of my hometown, snow, winter, the Civil War ... In a dream, a soundless blizzard passed in front of me, and then an old piano appeared and near it people who were no longer in the world. The story “Secret Friend” contains other details: “I pulled my barracks lamp as far as possible to the table and put on a pink paper cap over its green cap, which made the paper come to life. On it I wrote the words: "And the dead were judged according to what was written in the books, according to their deeds." Then he began to write, not yet knowing well what would come of it. I remember that I really wanted to convey how good it is when it's warm at home, the clock that strikes towers in the dining room, sleepy slumber in bed, books and frost ... ”With such a mood, Bulgakov began to create a new novel.

The novel "The White Guard", the most important book for Russian literature, Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov began writing in 1822.

In 1922-1924, Bulgakov wrote articles for the newspaper "Nakanune", was constantly published in the railway newspaper "Gudok", where he met I. Babel, I. Ilf, E. Petrov, V. Kataev, Yu. Olesha. According to Bulgakov himself, the idea of ​​the novel The White Guard finally took shape in 1922. At this time, several important events in his personal life took place: during the first three months of this year, he received news of the fate of his brothers, whom he never saw again, and a telegram about the sudden death of his mother from typhus. During this period, the terrible impressions of the Kyiv years received an additional impetus for embodiment in creativity.

According to the memoirs of contemporaries, Bulgakov planned to create a whole trilogy, and spoke about his favorite book like this: “I consider my novel a failure, although I single it out from my other things, because. I took the idea very seriously." And what we now call the "White Guard" was conceived as the first part of the trilogy and originally bore the names "Yellow Ensign", "Midnight Cross" and "White Cross": "The action of the second part should take place on the Don, and in the third part Myshlaevsky will be in the ranks of the Red Army. Signs of this plan can be found in the text of the "White Guard". But Bulgakov did not write the trilogy, leaving it to Count A.N. Tolstoy ("Walking through the torments"). And the theme of "running", emigration, in "The White Guard" is only hinted at in the history of Thalberg's departure and in the episode of reading Bunin's "The Gentleman from San Francisco".

The novel was created in an era of greatest material need. The writer worked at night in an unheated room, worked impulsively and enthusiastically, terribly tired: “Third life. And my third life blossomed at the desk. The pile of sheets was all swollen. I wrote with both pencil and ink. Subsequently, the author returned to his favorite novel more than once, reliving the past anew. In one of the entries relating to 1923, Bulgakov noted: “And I will finish the novel, and I dare to assure you, it will be such a novel, from which the sky will become hot ...” And in 1925 he wrote: “It will be a terrible pity, if I am mistaken and the “White Guard” is not a strong thing.” On August 31, 1923, Bulgakov informed Yu. Slezkin: “I have finished the novel, but it has not yet been rewritten, it lies in a pile, over which I think a lot. I'm fixing something." It was a draft version of the text, which is said in the "Theatrical Novel": "The novel must be corrected for a long time. You need to cross out many places, replace hundreds of words with others. Big but necessary work!” Bulgakov was not satisfied with his work, crossed out dozens of pages, created new editions and versions. But at the beginning of 1924, he was already reading excerpts from The White Guard by the writer S. Zayaitsky and his new friends Lyamins, considering the book finished.

The first known reference to the completion of the novel is in March 1924. The novel was published in the 4th and 5th books of the Rossiya magazine in 1925. And the 6th issue with the final part of the novel was not released. According to researchers, the novel The White Guard was completed after the premiere of Days of the Turbins (1926) and the creation of Run (1928). The text of the last third of the novel, corrected by the author, was published in 1929 by the Parisian publishing house Concorde. The full text of the novel was published in Paris: volume one (1927), volume two (1929).

Due to the fact that the White Guard was not published in the USSR, and foreign editions of the late 1920s were inaccessible in the writer's homeland, Bulgakov's first novel did not receive much press attention. The well-known critic A. Voronsky (1884-1937) at the end of 1925 called The White Guard, together with The Fatal Eggs, works of "outstanding literary quality." The answer to this statement was a sharp attack by the head of the Russian Association of Proletarian Writers (RAPP) L. Averbakh (1903-1939) in Rapp's organ - the magazine "At the Literary Post". Later, the production of the play Days of the Turbins based on the novel The White Guard at the Moscow Art Theater in the autumn of 1926 turned the attention of critics to this work, and the novel itself was forgotten.

K. Stanislavsky, worried about the passage of the Days of the Turbins, originally called, like the novel, The White Guard, through censorship, strongly advised Bulgakov to abandon the epithet "white", which seemed to many openly hostile. But the writer valued precisely this word. He agreed to “cross”, and “December”, and “blizzard” instead of “guard”, but he did not want to give up the definition of “white”, seeing in it a sign of the special moral purity of his beloved heroes, their belonging to the Russian intelligentsia as parts of the best layer in the country.

The White Guard is largely an autobiographical novel based on the writer's personal impressions of Kyiv in late 1918 - early 1919. The members of the Turbin family reflected the characteristic features of Bulgakov's relatives. Turbines is the maiden name of Bulgakov's grandmother on her mother's side. The manuscripts of the novel have not survived. Kyiv friends and acquaintances of Bulgakov became the prototypes of the heroes of the novel. Lieutenant Viktor Viktorovich Myshlaevsky was written off from a childhood friend of Nikolai Nikolaevich Syngaevsky.

The prototype of Lieutenant Shervinsky was another friend of Bulgakov's youth - Yuri Leonidovich Gladyrevsky, an amateur singer (this quality also passed to the character), who served in the troops of Hetman Pavel Petrovich Skoropadsky (1873-1945), but not as an adjutant. Then he emigrated. The prototype of Elena Talberg (Turbina) was Bulgakov's sister, Varvara Afanasievna. Captain Talberg, her husband, has many features in common with the husband of Varvara Afanasievna Bulgakova, Leonid Sergeevich Karuma (1888-1968), a German by birth, a career officer who served at first Skoropadsky, and then the Bolsheviks.

The prototype of Nikolka Turbin was one of the brothers M.A. Bulgakov. The second wife of the writer, Lyubov Evgenievna Belozerskaya-Bulgakova, wrote in her book “Memoirs”: “One of the brothers of Mikhail Afanasyevich (Nikolai) was also a doctor. It is on the personality of my younger brother, Nikolai, that I would like to dwell. The noble and cozy little man Nikolka Turbin has always been dear to my heart (especially based on the novel The White Guard. In the play Days of the Turbins, he is much more schematic.). In my life, I never managed to see Nikolai Afanasyevich Bulgakov. This is the youngest representative of the profession chosen in the Bulgakov family - a doctor of medicine, bacteriologist, scientist and researcher, who died in Paris in 1966. He studied at the University of Zagreb and was left there at the department of bacteriology.

The novel was created in a difficult time for the country. Young Soviet Russia, which did not have a regular army, was drawn into the Civil War. The dreams of the hetman-traitor Mazepa, whose name is not accidentally mentioned in Bulgakov's novel, came true. The "White Guard" is based on the events related to the consequences of the Brest Treaty, according to which Ukraine was recognized as an independent state, the "Ukrainian State" was created, headed by Hetman Skoropadsky, and refugees from all over Russia rushed "abroad". Bulgakov in the novel clearly described their social status.

The philosopher Sergei Bulgakov, the writer's cousin, in his book "At the Feast of the Gods" described the death of the motherland as follows: "There was a mighty power, needed by friends, terrible by enemies, and now it is a rotting carrion, from which piece after piece falls off to the delight of a flying crow. In place of the sixth part of the world, there was a fetid, gaping hole ... ”Mikhail Afanasyevich agreed with his uncle in many respects. And it is no coincidence that this terrible picture is reflected in the article by M.A. Bulgakov "Hot prospects" (1919). Studzinsky speaks about the same in the play "Days of the Turbins": "We had Russia - a great power ..." So for Bulgakov, an optimist and talented satirist, despair and sorrow became the starting points in creating a book of hope. It is this definition that most accurately reflects the content of the novel "The White Guard". In the book “At the Feast of the Gods,” another thought seemed closer and more interesting to the writer: “How Russia will become self-determined largely depends on what Russia will become.” The heroes of Bulgakov are painfully looking for the answer to this question.

In The White Guard, Bulgakov sought to show the people and the intelligentsia in the flames of the Civil War in Ukraine. The main character, Aleksey Turbin, although clearly autobiographical, but, unlike the writer, is not a zemstvo doctor, who was only formally registered in the military service, but a real military doctor who has seen and experienced a lot during the years of the World War. Much brings the author closer to his hero, and calm courage, and faith in old Russia, and most importantly - the dream of a peaceful life.

“Heroes must be loved; if this does not happen, I do not advise anyone to take up the pen - you will get the biggest trouble, just know it, ”the Theater Novel says, and this is the main law of Bulgakov’s creativity. In the novel "The White Guard" he speaks of white officers and intellectuals as ordinary people, reveals their young world of soul, charm, intelligence and strength, shows the enemies as living people.

The literary community refused to recognize the dignity of the novel. Out of almost three hundred reviews, Bulgakov counted only three positive ones, and classified the rest as "hostile and abusive." The writer received rude comments. In one of the articles, Bulgakov was called "a new-bourgeois offspring, splashing poisoned, but impotent saliva on the working class, on its communist ideals."

“Class untruth”, “a cynical attempt to idealize the White Guard”, “an attempt to reconcile the reader with the monarchist, Black Hundred officers”, “hidden counter-revolutionary” - this is not a complete list of characteristics that were given to the White Guard by those who believed that the main thing in literature is the political position of the writer, his attitude towards the "whites" and "reds".

One of the main motives of the "White Guard" is faith in life, its victorious power. That is why this book, considered forbidden for several decades, found its reader, found a second life in all the richness and brilliance of Bulgakov's living word. Viktor Nekrasov, a writer from Kiev who read The White Guard in the 1960s, quite rightly remarked: “Nothing, it turns out, has faded, nothing has become outdated. It was as if those forty years had never happened... an obvious miracle happened before our eyes, which happens very rarely in literature and far from everyone - a second birth took place. The life of the heroes of the novel continues today, but in a different direction.

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1924

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The novel The White Guard, which was written by Mikhail Bulgakov, is one of the main works of the writer. Bulgakov wrote the novel in 1923-1925, and at that moment he himself believed that the White Guard was the main work in his creative biography. It is known that Mikhail Bulgakov even once said that from this novel "the sky will become hot."

However, as the years passed, Bulgakov took a different look at his work and called the novel "failed". Some believe that most likely Bulgakov's idea was to create an epic in the spirit of Leo Tolstoy, but this did not work out.

Read below a summary of the novel The White Guard.

Winter 1918/19 A certain City, in which Kyiv is clearly guessed. The city is occupied by the German occupation troops, the hetman of "all Ukraine" is in power. However, Petliura's army may enter the City from day to day - fighting is already going on twelve kilometers from the City. The city lives a strange, unnatural life: it is full of visitors from Moscow and St. Petersburg - bankers, businessmen, journalists, lawyers, poets - who rushed there from the moment the hetman was elected, from the spring of 1918.

In the dining room of the Turbins' house at dinner, Alexei Turbin, a doctor, his younger brother Nikolka, a non-commissioned officer, their sister Elena and family friends - lieutenant Myshlaevsky, second lieutenant Stepanov, nicknamed Karas and lieutenant Shervinsky, adjutant in the headquarters of Prince Belorukov, commander of all the military forces of Ukraine - excitedly discussing the fate of their beloved City. Senior Turbin believes that the hetman is to blame for everything with his Ukrainization: until the very last moment he did not allow the formation of the Russian army, and if this happened on time, a select army of junkers, students, high school students and officers, of which there are thousands, would be formed, and not only would they have defended the City, but Petliura would not have had a spirit in Little Russia, moreover, they would have gone to Moscow and saved Russia.

Elena's husband, Captain of the General Staff Sergei Ivanovich Talberg, announces to his wife that the Germans are leaving the City and that he, Talberg, is being taken on the staff train departing tonight. Talberg is sure that even three months will not pass before he returns to the City with Denikin's army, which is now being formed on the Don. Until then, he can't take Elena into the unknown and she'll have to stay in the City.

To protect against the advancing troops of Petlyura, the formation of Russian military formations begins in the City. Karas, Myshlaevsky and Alexei Turbin come to the commander of the emerging mortar division, Colonel Malyshev, and enter the service: Karas and Myshlaevsky - as officers, Turbin - as a divisional doctor. However, the next night - from December 13 to 14 - the hetman and General Belorukov flee from the City in a German train, and Colonel Malyshev disbands the newly formed division: he has no one to defend, there is no legal authority in the City.

Colonel Nai-Tours by December 10 completes the formation of the second department of the first squad. Considering the conduct of the war without winter equipment for soldiers impossible, Colonel Nai-Tours, threatening the head of the supply department with a colt, receives felt boots and hats for his one hundred and fifty junkers. On the morning of December 14, Petliura attacks the City; Nai-Tours receives an order to guard the Polytechnic Highway and, in the event of the appearance of the enemy, to take the fight. Nai-Turs, having entered into battle with the advanced detachments of the enemy, sends three cadets to find out where the hetman's units are. The sent ones return with a message that there are no units anywhere, machine-gun fire is in the rear, and the enemy cavalry enters the City. Nye realizes that they are trapped.

An hour earlier, Nikolai Turbin, corporal of the third division of the first infantry squad, receives an order to lead the team along the route. Arriving at the appointed place, Nikolka sees with horror the running junkers and hears the command of Colonel Nai-Tours, ordering all the junkers - both his own and from Nikolka's team - to tear off shoulder straps, cockades, throw weapons, tear documents, run and hide. The colonel himself covers the withdrawal of the junkers. In front of Nikolka's eyes, the mortally wounded colonel dies. Shocked, Nikolka, leaving Nai-Turs, makes his way to the house through courtyards and lanes.

In the meantime, Alexei, who was not informed about the dissolution of the division, having appeared, as he was ordered, at two o'clock, finds an empty building with abandoned guns. Having found Colonel Malyshev, he gets an explanation of what is happening: the city is taken by Petliura's troops. Aleksey, tearing off his shoulder straps, goes home, but runs into Petliura's soldiers, who, recognizing him as an officer (in his haste he forgot to tear off the cockade from his hat), pursue him. Wounded in the arm, Alexei is sheltered in her house by a woman unknown to him named Yulia Reise. The next day, having changed Alexei into a civilian dress, Yulia takes him home in a cab. Simultaneously with Aleksey, Larion, Talberg's cousin, comes from Zhytomyr to the Turbins, who has experienced a personal drama: his wife left him. Larion really likes being in the Turbins' house, and all the Turbins find him very nice.

Vasily Ivanovich Lisovich, nicknamed Vasilisa, the owner of the house in which the Turbins live, occupies the first floor in the same house, while the Turbins live in the second. On the eve of the day when Petlyura entered the City, Vasilisa builds a hiding place in which she hides money and jewelry. However, through a gap in a loosely curtained window, an unknown person is watching Vasilisa's actions. The next day, three armed men come to Vasilisa with a search warrant. First of all, they open the cache, and then they take Vasilisa's watch, suit and shoes. After the "guests" left, Vasilisa and his wife guess that they were bandits. Vasilisa runs to the Turbins, and Karas is sent to protect them from a possible new attack. The usually stingy Vanda Mikhailovna, Vasilisa's wife, does not skimp here: there is cognac, veal, and pickled mushrooms on the table. Happy Karas is dozing, listening to Vasilisa's plaintive speeches.

Three days later, Nikolka, having learned the address of the Nai-Tours family, goes to the colonel's relatives. He tells Nye's mother and sister the details of his death. Together with the colonel's sister, Irina, Nikolka finds the body of Nai-Turs in the morgue, and on the same night, a funeral service is held in the chapel at the anatomical theater of Nai-Turs.

A few days later, Alexei's wound becomes inflamed, and in addition, he has typhus: high fever, delirium. According to the conclusion of the consultation, the patient is hopeless; On December 22, the agony begins. Elena locks herself in the bedroom and passionately prays to the Most Holy Theotokos, begging to save her brother from death. “Let Sergei not return,” she whispers, “but don’t punish this with death.” To the amazement of the doctor on duty with him, Alexei regains consciousness - the crisis has passed.

A month and a half later, the finally recovered Alexei goes to Yulia Reisa, who saved him from death, and gives her the bracelet of his deceased mother. Alexei asks Yulia for permission to visit her. After leaving Yulia, he meets Nikolka, who is returning from Irina Nai-Tours.

Elena receives a letter from a friend from Warsaw, in which she informs her about Thalberg's upcoming marriage to their mutual friend. Elena, sobbing, remembers her prayer.

On the night of February 2-3, Petliura's troops begin to leave the City. The roar of the guns of the Bolsheviks approaching the City is heard.

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The image of the house in the novel "The White Guard" is central. It unites the heroes of the work, protects them from danger. The turning point events in the country instill anxiety and fear in the souls of people. And only home comfort and warmth can create the illusion of peace and security.

1918

The year nineteen hundred and eighteen is great. But he's also scary. Kyiv, on the one hand, was occupied by German troops, on the other - by the hetman's army. And rumors about the arrival of Petlyura instill more and more anxiety in the townspeople, who are already frightened. Visitors and all sorts of dubious personalities scurry about in the street. Anxiety is even in the air. Such Bulgakov portrayed the situation in Kyiv in the last year of the war. And he used the image of the house in the novel "The White Guard" so that his characters could hide, at least for a while, from the impending danger. The characters of the main characters are revealed precisely within the walls of the Turbins' apartment. Everything outside of it is like another world, scary, wild and incomprehensible.

intimate conversations

The theme of the house in the novel "The White Guard" plays an important role. The Turbins' apartment is cozy and warm. But here, too, the characters of the novel argue, conduct political discussions. Aleksey Turbin, the oldest occupant of this apartment, scolds the Ukrainian hetman, whose most innocuous offense is that he forced the Russian population to speak a "vile language." Then he spews curses at the representatives of the hetman's army. However, the obsceneness of his words does not detract from the truth that lurks in them.

Myshlaevsky, Stepanov and Shervinsky, Nikolka's younger brother, are all excitedly discussing what is happening in the city. And also here is Elena - the sister of Alexei and Nikolka.

But the image of the house in the novel "The White Guard" is not the embodiment of a family hearth and not a refuge for dissident personalities. This is a symbol of what is still bright and real in a dilapidated country. A political turning point always gives rise to unrest and robbery. And people, in peacetime, it would seem, are quite decent and honest, in difficult situations they show their true face. Turbines and their friends are few who have not been made worse by the changes in the country.

Thalberg's betrayal

At the beginning of the novel, Elena's husband leaves the house. He runs away into the unknown with a "rat run". Listening to her husband's assurances of an imminent return with Denikin's army, Elena, "aged and grown ugly", understands that he will not return. And so it happened. Thalberg had connections, he took advantage of them and was able to escape. And already at the end of the work, Elena learns about his upcoming marriage.

The image of the house in the novel "The White Guard" is a kind of fortress. But for cowardly and selfish people, she is like a sinking ship for rats. Thalberg flees, and only those who can trust each other remain. Those who are not capable of betrayal.

Autobiographical work

Based on his own life experience, Bulgakov created this novel. "The White Guard" is a work in which the characters express the thoughts of the author himself. The book is not nationwide, as it is dedicated only to a certain social stratum close to the writer.

Bulgakov's heroes turn to God more than once in the most difficult moments. There is complete harmony and mutual understanding in the family. This is how Bulgakov imagined the ideal house. But, perhaps, the theme of the house in the novel "The White Guard" was inspired by the author's youthful memories.

Universal hatred

In 1918, anger prevailed in the cities. It had an impressive scale, as it was generated by the centuries-old hatred of the peasants towards the nobles and officers. And to this it is also worth adding the anger of the local population towards the invaders and Petliurists, whose appearance is awaited with horror. All this the author depicted on the example of the Kyiv events. And only the parental home in the novel "The White Guard" is a bright, kind image, inspiring hope. And here, not only Aleksey, Elena and Nikolka can hide from external life storms.

The house of the Turbins in the novel "The White Guard" becomes a haven for people who are close in spirit to their inhabitants. Myshlaevsky, Karas and Shervinsky became relatives to Elena and her brothers. They know about everything that happens in this family - about all the sorrows and hopes. And they are always welcome here.

mother's testament

Turbina Sr., who died shortly before the events described in the work, bequeathed to her children to live together. Elena, Alexey and Nikolka keep their promise, and only this saves them. Love, understanding and support do not allow them to perish - the components of the true Home. And even when Alexei is dying, and the doctors call him "hopeless", Elena continues to believe and finds support in prayers. And, to the surprise of the doctors, Alexei is recovering.

The author paid much attention to the elements of the interior in the Turbins' house. Small details create a striking contrast between this apartment and the one below. The atmosphere in Lisovich's house is cold and uncomfortable. And after the robbery, Vasilisa goes to the Turbins for spiritual support. Even this seemingly unpleasant character feels safe in the house of Elena and Alexei.

The world outside of this house is mired in confusion. But here they still sing songs, sincerely smile at each other and boldly look danger in the eye. This atmosphere also attracts another character - Lariosik. Talberg's relative almost immediately became his own here, which Elena's husband failed to do. The thing is that a guest from Zhitomir has such qualities as kindness, decency and sincerity. And they are obligatory for a long stay in the house, the image of which was depicted so vividly and colorfully by Bulgakov.

The White Guard is a novel that was published over 90 years ago. When a play based on this work was staged in one of the Moscow theaters, the audience, whose fates were so similar to the lives of the heroes, wept and fainted. This work has become extremely close to those who survived the events of 1917-1918. But the novel did not lose its relevance later. And some fragments in it are unusually reminiscent of the present. And this once again confirms that a real literary work is always, at any time, relevant.